Pokemon Sun and Moon: New trailer names legendary Pokemon and introduces first characters

An overview of the multi-island Alola region in Pokémon Sun and Moon.The Pokémon Company

For the second month running, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company have treated fans to another batch of exciting reveals for its upcoming Nintendo 3DS games, Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon. The latest trailer announced that the box-art legendary Pokémon will be named Solgaleo and Lunala and unveiled several features for its seventh generation games, scheduled for a November 2016 launch.

Starting off with the cover stars, Sun's handsome, white lion Solgaleo was confirmed as a Psychic/Steel-type with a unique new move called Sunsteel Strike. Moon's Lunala meanwhile is a Psychic/Ghost-type with its own signature attack, Moongeist Beam.

The pair also come with brand-new passive abilities, with Solgaleo's Full Metal Body ensuring that its "stats will not be lowered by the effects of an opponent's moves or Ability" and Lunala's Shadow Shield which allows the "ancient" Pokémon to "take less damage from an attack that lands when the Pokémon has full HP."

The trailer (below) also confirmed a few topics of speculation around the game's Alola region and several of its key NPC inhabitants. Mostly notably, we can see that Alola will be a multi-island region so it might be worth consider which Pokemon will be learning Surf early on.

The casually dressed chap in the sunglasses we saw last month has been confirmed as this generation's Pokemon guru named 'Professor Kukai'. The cool-dude scientist is also joined by a "mysterious" assistant called Lillie who Nintendo acknowledged "will play an important role in the story of Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon."

Kukai is seen in the trailer chatting to the customisable player avatar and teases further legendary encounters by saying: "That could be the reason the region is chock full of nothin' but rare Pokémon, yeah."

We are also introduced to the player character's enthusiastic 'friend' Hau, who is looking more and more like Sun and Moon's main rival NPC.

While the in-battle appearance of Gengar and Salamence will excite series fans, the most bizarre reveal from the teaser is the shape-shifting electric type Rotom who will reside inside your Pokédex in both Sun and Moon. Yes, that's right, there's actually Pokemon living inside the Pokédex this time around.

The household appliance-aping pocket monster adds new features to the vanilla Pokédex however, including QR functionality and in-game advice. The Pokemon Company expanded on the Rotom Pokédex in an accompanying press release:

"The Rotom Pokédex does much more than record Pokémon info—it has its own personality. Besides showing the player's current location and their next destination, the Rotom Pokédex also provides advice on where to go next, based on the conversations players have with other characters.

In Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon, a QR Scanner function allows players to see information about Pokémon when they scan QR Code patterns. By scanning in special QR Code patterns, fans can register Pokémon of the Alola region to their Pokédex and find out where they live. If they scan in the QR Code for a Pokémon that they haven't yet caught, players can check its habitat and search it out."

YouTube / The Official Pokemon Channel

Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon are set for release on Nintendo 3DS on 23 November 2016 in Europe and on 18 November 2016 in the US and Japan.